April 18, 2024
With greatly improved performance as of recent, Starlink has changed the internet game for home and business users alike. Their continual launch of new satellites in 2023 and 2024 has resulted in a LEO satellite internet network benefiting from stronger uptime reliability as well as faster download and upload speeds and lower latency.
In this guide, we’ll walk through how to pick a business Starlink internet service plan. We primarily focus on business users, but Metro Wireless has been known to get residential inquiries for commercial-grade service where budget allows, so all are welcome!
A shameless plug: please see our business Starlink offering here for more information on our Managed Starlink service!
As of 2024, Starlink internet access offers two types of dish hardware: the Standard, and the Flat High Performance dish. Continue reading for a breakdown on the two dish kits.
Starlink’s basic hardware offering is now their Standard dish, which is an updated version of their Standard Actuated Dish. This dish is for household, RV, nomad, and camper usage, and notably not for commercial, maritime, emergency response, nor mobile businesses.
The Standard Starlink dish comes with the dish, kickstand, Gen 3 router, Starlink cable, AC cable, and power supply— everything you need to get you online at home or on the open road.
Weighing in at about seven pounds with the included kickstand, this hardware option has a 110-degree field of view (versus the 140-degree FOV on the Flat High Performance) and typically consumes no more than 100 watts.
As a quick aside, both the Starlink Standard and the now discontinued Standard Actuated Dish offer the same level of reliability and internet performance, but the updated ‘Standard’ dish launched with a lightly updated design that has better weatherproofing and connector sealing than the older style. Further, the Standard Actuated version had a motorized base that automatically adjusted its position for optimal satellite position, whereas the new Standard version is a fixed base.
The upgraded hardware offering is Starlink’s Flat High Performance dish, which is an updated version of their discontinued High Performance dish. This dish is for business, maritime, mobile businesses (e.g., food trucks and mobile office trailers), and first/emergency responders.
In the Flat High Performance Dish kit box comes the dish, base, power supply, router, and five assorted cables for power and data transfer.
Weighing in at 13 pounds, the Flat High Performance dish option has a 140-degree field of view (beating the Standard dish’s 110-degree FOV) and typically consumes no more than 150 watts. As a result, the Flat High Performance dish also benefits from a superior heat management system, allowing it to melt snow and ice about 1.7 times faster than the Standard dish. It also performs better in higher temperatures, up to 122-degress Fahrenheit. Finally, the upgraded Flat High Performance dish boasts an IP56 rating versus the Standard Dish’s IP54 rating, resulting in better dust and water protection.
As a quick tangent, both the Starlink Flat High Performance and the now discontinued High Performance Dish offer the same level of reliability and internet performance, but like the Standard dish’s updates, the new Flat High Performance dish launched with a lightly updated design that has better weatherproofing and connector sealing than the older style. Further, the old High Performance version had a motorized base that automatically adjusted its position for optimal satellite position, whereas the new Flat High Performance version is a fixed base.
In short, the Flat High Performance dish has a ‘beefier’ design than the Standard dish, resulting in its higher performance potential geared toward business use. Its higher power and larger field of view, along with its triple antenna array versus the Standard’s single antenna array, offers faster speeds, higher uptime reliability, and lower latency—that’s because a larger field of view and additional antenna arrays ensure the Flat High Performance dish has the best possibility of connecting to the most Starlink satellites at any given time.
In addition to the dish hardware differences, Starlink distinguishes business usage from home and residential usage based on its available service plan tiers.
The primary factors are network prioritization data allotments (Priority and Mobile Priority Data) as well as expected download and upload speeds performance.
Starlink’s premier service tiers are their Priority options: the Priority plan and Mobile Priority plan. These business focused internet plans are intended to be used by commercial users, marine environments (we’ve heard of cruise ships leveraging business Starlink), and first responders.
Priority data plans are for ‘fixed site’ applications where the dish and service area aren’t expected to change often. Most standing buildings would fit this description, so it’s a great option for most business internet users. Alternatively, for Starlink business internet users looking to use Starlink on the go, Mobile Priority plans make more sense. This is recommended for mobile businesses (e.g., food trucks), maritime, and first emergency responders. For reasons we’ll explain later, we don’t recommend a Mobile Priority plan if you’re intending to use business Starlink at one, single location.
Alternatively, the Standard and Mobile plans are intended for residential and RV/camper usage. They include unlimited yet lower-network priority standard or mobile data and are subject to network congestion where slower speeds and higher latency would be observed. Home, fixed-site users should leverage the Standard plan, whereas campers and digital nomads should leverage the Mobile plan.
Like how the big US cellular carriers like Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T market their ‘unlimited data plans’ that have a big asterisk, Starlink operates the same way.
First, to assuage any concerns of losing connectivity, Starlink includes unlimited Standard (or Mobile data, for Mobile plan users) data across all their plans. Standard (and Mobile) data is the basic Starlink internet offering, and is intended for general, consumer usage. It can be subject to slowdowns and overall performance reductions due to network congestion and other factors. More on that later.
Alternatively, Priority plans, including Mobile Priority options, offer the ‘fast lane on the highway’ experience as Priority tier include the highest importance on the Starlink network. This data will always have the fastest download and upload speeds, as well as lowest latency. This is the good stuff that businesses want!
As said above, normal Priority plans are intended to be used at one business location whereas Mobile Priority plans allow usage ‘on the go’. Further, per Starlink’s terms of service, the definition of their data allocations is slightly different:
Regardless of whether a client wants to use a standard or a Priority plan, Starlink offers multiple data plan options, as seen in the screenshot below. Priority plans are seen with the allotment of Priority (or Mobile Priority) data included per month, whereas Standard and non-Priority Mobile plans show just unlimited usage of Standard or Mobile Inland data.
Business Starlink users should expect upgraded speed performance on the commercial-focused Priority and Mobile Priority plans versus the basic Standard and Mobile plans. Here is a breakdown by plan, along with a screenshot below directly from Starlink:
We also note differing latency performance from the mobility plans— the Mobile and Mobile Priority plans— versus the fixed site offerings. The Mobile plans will average <99Ms of latency while the fixed site plans offer 25-60Ms latency, on average. We expect that a mobility plan user should see the best latency performance when the dish is not moving, and the increased latency of 61-89Ms would only be observed while the dish is used in motion.
More intangibly, Starlink offers different customer support for its standard plans versus Priority plans. Basic Starlink support is handled via a website portal with a chat-bot-based system, whereas the priority plans benefit from ‘dedicated customer support' which is still handled via the portal (no dedicated phone number for NOC support!), but allegedly promises 72-hour response times.
We at Metro Wireless find even Starlink’s ‘upgraded’ Priority support to be unacceptable for business needs, and hence as part of our Managed Starlink offering, we offer 24/7/365 NOC support from a US-based team with <30 second average hold times. Our NOC Support team also has direct access to tier-2 support engineers at Starlink, so we can get problems resolved fast!
Starlink has strongly worded legal language against the misuse of its residentially focused Standard dish hardware and plans for any commercial usage. It is against their terms of service for commercial business users to use their cheaper and lower tier plans, and there are reports of Starlink shutting down internet service to accounts that are caught misusing the network. Similarly, do not expect
Similarly to not using the home focused Standard Starlink plan for business needs, commercial users are not authorized to use the standard Priority plan for internet needs where the dish is expected to move often (i.e., more than once a week). Users who have mobile businesses or internet connectivity needs where the dish is expected to move around must elect for the Mobile Priority plan.
Our primary plan recommendation for fixed site business users with one location is the Priority 1Tb plan, paired with the requisite Flat High Performance dish. We find that most small and medium sized businesses operating in rural areas don’t typically need more than 1Tb of data per month and should be fine with using Standard data after that. While more affordable, the lower 40Gb Priority plan should only be used for leveraging Starlink as a failover, redundant connection to backup an existing primary internet connection. Finally, the 2Tb Priority plan should be considered for bandwidth heavy commercial clients with high user volumes or with bandwidth intensive applications. It should be noted that all Priority plans can temporarily increase their Priority data allotments by the gig for an additional cost. Similarly, the Mobile plan offers users the ability to purchase Mobile Priority data by the Gb as well.
A final shameless plug: please see our business Starlink offering here for more information on our Managed Starlink service!
